Damien Rice was a revelation at Kings Theater tonight.
I absolutely loved his music when I first heard songs like “Volcano” and “Blower’s Daughter” on his 2002 solo debut “O”, totally connecting with the singer-songwriter plaintive high-emotion ballad persona, with the solo acoustic guitar and voice arrangements. It resonated so strongly with so much of what I listened to and my own style of playing and songwriting.
He was absolutely huge in Ireland but also broke into international success. His songs began appearing in movies and TV shows. He was on his way.
Over the years he got sparse and erratic – one more solo record four years later with 2006’s “9,” which even he wasn’t satisfied with. While it was successful and sonically and emotionally similar to “O,” maybe it was *too* similar. Perhaps he hadn’t moved on emotionally, perhaps he lacked a certain diversity in his sound, a little development of his approach.
His next record took eight years to appear – and 2014’s “My Favourite Faded Fantasy” did indeed seem a touch faded in that it felt like it was cut from the same cloth as the predecessors.
I got a big jaded with Damien Rice, but still decided why not get a ticket when I saw he was touring – I’d never seen him live.
Tonight’s show was an epic acquittal, a challenge to my tendency to second guess and question whether a musician is obliged to find brand new sounds versus having the right to write songs in their own vein.
For most of the set he commanded a rapt spellbound sold out Kings Theater with just his guitar and voice (guitar swapped for organ on a couple of songs), occasional touches of distortion, tasteful lighting. On some songs he was accompanied by a female singer and cellist. For a couple of tracks late in the set his entrancing opening act Silvia Pérez Cruz joined him. But for most of the set it was just him alone in total control of his audience, fleshing out his songs with a casual mastery, filling out the emotion, breathing life and substance into every memory I had of listening to “O” over and over, hearing the soundtrack of my life and struggles, breathing in the feelings and breathing out the catharsis and the resonance.
He even spoke about that connection, that process of musicians using music as an “emotional toilet” to flush out all the “mental shit we carry around.” His between-song banter was illuminating, compelling, and hilarious.
“People think I’m this depressed sad person,” he said, but in fact that’s just because his songs are his way of processing those parts of his life that need expressing. “The people who come to my shows are way more depressed and sad than me,” he said to spontaneous laughter from the audience, “so welcome to your therapy session.”
The old songs sounded like it was still 2002 or 2006. Even older songs I’d never heard before – at least one from his prior indie band Juniper – were explosive and incredible. At times I was struck by the sense that he was putting out David Grey level confidence and sound. Newer material where he duetted with Silvia Pérez Cruz while playing the organ sounded like Damien Rice through a Dead Can Dance / This Mortal Coil filter.
He wrapped the encore and the 16 song set with a new number, once more duetting with his cellist, stripping back to just the guitar accompaniment, leaving the audience with the teasing sign-off line that he would not promise new recordings because he takes eight years each time.
And leaving me inspired and energized to want to get back to basics and start again with guitar and voice and stop worrying about results, about why this album or that album of mine, that project, this attempt, this wish, that promotional campaign, those videos, whatever, didn’t find their audience.
Usually it’s Nick Cave who reminds me without saying it that I never need to question why I do what I do. We musicians do it because it’s what we are and there is really no choice and no sense looking for reason or justification or even approval. Just as Nick Cave says in “Push the Sky Away” – “some people say it’s just rock and roll
Ah but it gets you right down to your soul.”
Yes – usually it’s Nick Cave live where I am reminded and rebooted and reconnected. But tonight it was Damien Rice.
ronanconroy 